Raising Confident Kids: Dr. Rich Orbé-Austin On Parenting Without Impostor Syndrome
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Hello, this is Richard Jacobs with the Finding Genius Podcast. My guest today is Dr. Rich Orbea-Austin. He's the author of a book called Your Child's Greatness. We're going to talk about the book. It's Your Child's Greatness, A Parent's Guide to Raising Children Without Imposter Syndrome and Raising Confident Kids, Tools to Foster Self-Esteem and Emotional Regulation.

He's also done a book called Breaking the Cycle of Imposter Syndrome, how to help children trust themselves and embrace the unique journey. A lot of different books, a lot of different stuff he's done. He's a licensed psychologist, executive coach and consultant. He's actually founding director of NYU's Graduate Student Career Development Center. So, you know, a lot of work. Sounds like helping thousands and thousands of teens and kids and parents. So thank you for what you do.

And welcome to the show. It's a pleasure to be on, Rich. Thank you. Yeah, tell me a bit about your background. Why, it may sound silly to ask, but why wouldn't everybody? But why do you have this passion, it seems like, for kids and helping them overcome these mental traumas they have? Sure. So, you know, as you said, I'm a licensed psychologist. And I knew from a very early age that I wanted to help people. I think as far as eighth grade, I had a...

a column in the school newspaper called "Ask Dr. Rich." Fortunately, I was able to pursue that dream of becoming a psychologist. And in working as a psychologist, I had an opportunity to work in a variety of different settings, hospitals, career counseling centers, college counseling centers. And I realized that it was so critical to help young people at those key periods of their development. And so certainly while I was in college, I really had an opportunity to work with young people then.

In 2020, my partner and I, Dr. Lisa Orbe-Austin, and I had an opportunity to write our first book called On Your Greatness, Overcome Imposter Syndrome, Beat Self-Doubt, and Succeed in Life. And it was a step-by-step guide to overcoming imposter syndrome. And for those who may not know what imposter syndrome is, it's a phenomenon where you feel very much like you are a fraud, that you tend to underestimate your ability to overestimate

others. You attribute your success to luck or to a relationship. You tend to overwork to prove that you belong. And you constantly feel like you're going to be exposed as an imposter. And in writing that book, while the feedback we kept getting consistently from people who were parents were, why don't you or when will you write a book focused on how to make sure parents are

not helping their children or preventing their children from developing imposter syndrome, in essence. So we had at the time another idea to focus on a book, our second book, focused on imposter syndrome in the workplace. And then fortunately enough, we had the opportunity finally to write

our latest book, Your Child's Greatness, to really help people to understand caregivers, mentors, coaches, parents, anyone who works with young people, how to ensure that you prevent some of the elements that tend to trigger or develop imposter syndrome in young people. And so we're super excited about this opportunity to once again work with young people and those who engage with them to make sure that they are the healthiest and happiest throughout their developments.

Okay. I mean, when, where, and how do kids get to, you know, imposter syndrome? Does it come from parents or like where does this tend to come from? Sure. So we talk about the fact that a good deal of the origins of imposter syndrome are in

early childhood experiences. And one of the most important and critical childhood experiences that may contribute to imposter syndrome is the role that you take up in your family. And there are three primary roles that we talk about. So the first one is you are identified as a smart one, as a young person.

And even though you may have had siblings, cousins, or other people who might have achieved just as well as you had academically, you were identified solely as smart one. And as you continued on your academic path and met some level of adversity, you then began to wonder, is it actually true that I was smart? So then you start to doubt yourself and feel like, well, maybe I was an imposter this whole time. Maybe I'm not smart. So that's one role. Second role in contrast is the hard work. So you, again, may have had just as good of a grade

as someone who's identified as a smart one, but you are identified as the hardworking, more socially adept one. And so the messaging for you is that, well, you're not necessarily that smart. And so the only way you will be successful is to work very hard or to please other people. And so that hardworking person then begins to think that the only way they can belong to demonstrate that they are good enough is through overworking, unfortunately.

And then the last role in childhood we talk about is that of the survivor. So you may not have had any particular feedback. This is someone who's been neglected during the childhood experience. So they weren't identified as hardworking or smart. They just were trying to survive. So they never really had a sense of what their strengths were, what their actual skills were. And so they were left to then believe

that they weren't good enough and that they were imposters. And so when we think about ensuring that children don't develop imposter syndrome, we talk about the fact that children shouldn't have just one role. You can be a smart one. You can be the hardworking one. The role should not be that fixed because that can contribute to the development of imposter syndrome.

So what percentage of, is it teens or kids? Or when, like, what age does this arise? Oh, that's a great question. So the research tends to indicate that anywhere between 70 to 80% of people will experience imposter feelings at some point in their life. For some, it may be when they are in school, in grade school, in high school. For some, it may be when they get into the world of work. And so what we know is that ultimately that the good deal of it

originates from those childhood experiences. And that's why we want to be able to intervene at that key period of one's life. But again, what ages does this tend to arise? Like all ages or is there certain ones? Yeah, I would say once you get into school age and you start to identify as a particular role. And so for some ages, it may be once you're in grade school or in high school in that period, it may start to arise, but you may not understand it as imposter syndrome until later in

in your college or work world experience. But typically it's probably in those early childhood. Once you enter into grade school, you start being evaluated and identified and put in particular groups. But how do you help these kids? Like who recognized kid, the parents, school, whatever?

What does it look like when maybe the kid themselves doesn't even know what's going on that works with them frequently sees it? Sure. So it could be a parent. It could be a teacher. If a child says consistently, well, I'm really not that smart. The only way I'm successful is because I got very lucky. That tends to be a sign that they may be dealing with imposter syndrome for a

A child that tends to constantly say, well, everyone is much brighter than me. Everyone's much smarter than me. I really don't necessarily, the only way I can be successful is I have to work really, really, really hard. That's a pattern that we see when a child does not necessarily succeed.

want to take risks in a classroom setting or in particular performance setting because they feel like they may be exposed as a fraud. So they don't raise their hand because they don't think that they know the answer to something. They don't want to be exposed as being stupid. So that tends to be a pattern. So a teacher can...

Notice that coach can notice that a parent can notice it at particular points. It's how the child really speaks about themselves and in comparison to others and as a whole that we begin to see some of those particular signs of imposter syndrome developing.

Okay, well, what is the therapy for? How do you help kids? So one of the things that we talk about with imposter syndrome, thankfully, it is not a mental health disorder. It's more of a phenomenon. And so the intervention is really being able to think about some of the key elements that contribute to it. And so in this latest book that we've written, we talk about the

three B's model, which is belonging, blooming, and being. So in belonging, we talk about developing a healthy identity. And so helping children to understand who they are, what their strengths are, what their particular areas of challenge are. Also in belonging, we talk about how to form healthy relationships, how to make sure that you're valued in the relationships that you seek.

And then finally, in Belonging, we talk about the fact that you want to be able to know how to advocate for yourself and manage conflict. It's not a bad thing. It's how you particularly manage it. And then the next phase is blooming. And one of the things that we talk about is how to reduce performance anxiety. Performance anxiety tends to be one of the major factors that may be triggering for young people who are dealing with imposter syndrome, that they feel like any particular performance, they'll be exposed as a fraud. That's what I was going to tell you is right. It

At first, you didn't mention any of the negative, but it seems like, I don't know, so many people are anxious, depressed, having all these, I don't know, extreme emotions. How do you get through to someone that, I don't know, maybe has a baseline of anxiety all the time or has a baseline of hyperactivity and depression and no CDN or whatever?

You know, all these things that are going on with kids, it doesn't seem like you're starting from like a good place. And now it seems like you're starting from a really difficult place. Any help? Right. So what we recognize is that imposter syndrome tends to be what we call comorbid with anxiety, depression. And so when we're dealing with a young person, we then do an evaluation to see, okay, is it solely imposter syndrome? Is it anxiety? And therefore, we then need to

if it is anxiety and depression and really help them to know and understand what are some of the things that may be contributing to that. One of the things that we oftentimes talk about with imposter syndrome is notion of perfectionism, that young people feel like the only way that they can actually not be exposed to fraud is to be perfect.

And as you can imagine, that causes a great deal of anxiety. It can also lead them to being depressed if they do make a mistake. And so it's helping them to learn and to understand that it's not the perfectionism that makes them successful. It's their own skills and abilities. And so we talk about how to help them give up perfectionism while striving for greatness, which is a key piece of the puzzle. Rather than feeling like you can't make any mistake, it's really how do you improve day by day and excel based on the unique skills that you have and improve.

always being able to internalize your successes that people with imposter syndrome tend to feel like they don't have any successes or again, any successes based on luck. So helping them both internalize success, but also cope with failure. Failure is a part of life does not mean that it confirms that you are an imposter. It means that you need to think about how to develop in particular areas.

And then finally, when we talk about how important it is to learn how to regulate yourself emotionally and form strong communities, the interventions really are, one, from a unique perspective, helping that young person to understand what are their distinct challenges, but also being able to utilize this model to help anyone dealing with imposter syndrome or preventing them from developing imposter syndrome in the first place. Okay, well, I read some details, like what

What do you do with kids? How do you help them? How do you work with them? Before we continue, I've been personally funding the Finding Genius podcast for four and a half years now, which has led to 2,700 plus interviews of clinicians, researchers, scientists, CEOs, and other amazing people who are working to advance science and improve our lives and our world. Even though this podcast gets 100,000 plus downloads a month, we need your help to reach hundreds of thousands more worldwide.

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So when we deal with or work with a young person, for instance, that's dealing with a boss syndrome, and we talk about how to help them change their narrative about themselves. So the narrative is the story we tell ourselves about ourselves. So a young person may say again, well, the only reason that I...

have done well in school is because, you know, Ms. Jackson liked it and I got lucky on some tests. Then we help them to challenge that particular narrative and really help them to understand how to develop what we call a thicker narrative. People in foster syndrome, young people in foster syndrome have what we call a thin narrative. They attribute everything to luck or a relationship.

while neglecting their actual skills and abilities. So we help them to really think about how to develop a thicker narrative that really involves them identifying their actual strengths and skills. And then we help them to reduce what we call automatic negative thoughts. And so those thoughts that tend to come into their minds as soon as they're in a situation that's triggering for them. So for instance,

One of the major automatic negative thoughts is mind reading, where you say to yourself, well, I know everyone thinks I'm stupid or not that bright. Or fortune telling, where you say, well, if I raise my hand, I know I'm going to get the wrong answer and everyone's going to laugh at me. Or catastrophizing, where you say, you know, if I do this, it's going to turn out horribly, so I'm not even going to attempt it.

By helping them identify their distinct automatic negative thoughts, we help them to one, challenge that ant because it's so strongly held. But then we say, well, what is that evidence actually that that's true? Can you actually read minds? There is no evidence that anyone thinks that you're stupid. And then we help them to reframe

their automatic negative thoughts to become more automatic positive statements about themselves and consistently practice that to really help them to know and understand what it is that makes them unique and strong in their particular environments, whether it's school, whether it's in the community, whether it's friends, whether it's in the workplace. There's more backdrops, though. I mean, I say this because I have three teenage kids, so I see it. My wife and I are still together after 26 years, which is incredible.

Incredibly rare. Phenomenal, right? Unfortunately. But yet of all the friends my kids have, they all come from broken homes. So I think what's happening too is like they're probably dealing with critical parents or absent parents or both. Like the parents just not around, self-absorbed. And when they are, they're yelling and screaming and criticizing. So this is trauma to everyone that they deal with. And if you have a group of friends and everyone's kind of grown up in the same environment,

crappy environment with critical parents, let's say, or absent ones, I would think that that reinforces socially amongst the group. So how do you do what you do? Because again, by the time you get to them, they've been listening to their parents all the time that they grew up. Now maybe they're at a point where they don't want to listen to their parents and they'd rather listen to their friends, but they're damaged already. They've got this in them. How do you fix this with all this outside pressure going on?

Yeah.

We know and understand that that's not the healthy way to go. But for some of these kids, they end up being successful just because they're trying to please that parent. And so when we're talking about imposter syndrome, there's a people-pleasing piece to it where you either have a narcissistic parent or you have a parent that is really codependent

and causes you to feel like everything must be focused on their needs. And so on one hand, it's not trying to blame the parent, but really having conversations with the young person about who they are in comparison to their friends, in comparison to other people who they might feel are more successful or

more popular, whatever it may be, but having hard conversations about what it is that they bring to the table and what it is that they will want to give up in that element. So when you talk about the fact that, yes, some of your kids' friends may come from broken homes, they want to listen to these kids, these kids may already be damaged, part of it is helping your kids or any kids to really know and understand that they are different.

than their friends. And it doesn't mean that that's a bad thing, but it's helping them to own who they are uniquely so that they can truly value that each and every day, as difficult as it might be given the circles that they run in. So you find you're able still with all the outside influences, TikTok, parents, friends, school, society, you're still able to get through to people.

Yeah. And social media is a huge challenge because the belief is there is a certain way to be. There's a certain way to show up in the world, whether it's TikTok, whether it's Instagram, whatever it may be, Snapchat. And the work is really about helping them to establish their own unique identity, even if sometimes it may mean failing.

that they no longer feel as connected to, you know, a friend or be friend. But it's really having those conversations and helping them to, you know, recognize who they are in the grand scheme of things and understanding all those challenges. But it takes time. It's not going to happen in one conversation. It's not going to happen in two conversations. It's consistently working with that young person, having them show up, really having them

Being supportive networks and environments, whether it's, you know, supportive teachers, whether it's supportive coaches or mentors. So it takes a whole community to help engage with that young person to really change, you know, their mind frame while also battling, as you said, some of these toxic elements that they are constantly facing every day, which is different than what we faced when we were coming up.

what are some techniques you've had to develop? I mean, without giving away like secret sauce, like what, what have you had to do to accommodate? First of all, how long have you been doing this? And second of all, what have you seen change in the kids you work with over the years? So I will say that I've been doing this work for over 20 years and the

the biggest thing that we see is the shift in the impact of social media. And oftentimes what we talk about is the fact that social media, as the name implies, is supposed to be something that connects people, but it actually makes young people feel more isolated and disconnected, right? And so it's really being able to

develop strategies that help them to feel like they're not alone, that some of the things that they're going through aren't just uniquely about them. And so some of it is really being able to have those discussions and helping them to find people who may be experiencing some of those same things and developing social networks that are offline.

that help them to develop more healthy coping strategies when they're dealing with things. And one of the things that I talked about is, and the changes, when someone was struggling, a young person was struggling, say, at school, whether it was through bullying or other aspects, a good deal of it would just be left at school or at

in the neighborhood. Here, it's 24-7, right? So they can't really escape it because then they're being bullied through social media and they're always on. So it's helping them to disconnect from it. It's helping them to form offline relationships that are meaningful to them. It's helping them to see that it's worth their time to do that because a lot of these young people don't actually have

the skill or the actual preference to engage with people offline and they feel very awkward or uncomfortable, which is the other thing that I've seen over these years where people can see. And I had this experience the other day, even with one of my daughters in talking about how it just feels uncomfortable to take a walk with one of their friends and they'd rather just be on their phone. Right. It was like, you know, and I was like, well, what is that? You see them every day.

They're like, oh, it's just be, you know, kind of weird. I wouldn't know what to say. And the other experience we had, she has these, you know, friends online and she sees them in the fencing tournaments and they don't say anything to each other. They know each other. They kind of engage with one another online. And it was perplexing to me because I said, hey, had you ever seen her in person? And she was like, oh, we see each other, but we never talk.

I was like, well, why don't you talk in person? Because you're very active with one another online. And so even that, even though I've done this work for so long, even that was a shock to me, right? And to really say that there's a level of discomfort and anxiety in young people who have just engaged interpersonally in how to help them develop the skills to do that. Yeah, that's crazy. Like, what do you do? Do you invite their friends over and then take them out for an activity where they can't use the phones? Like,

What can you do to help? Yeah. You actually have them take some time off the phone and really do something in person with those friends and have a good time doing it. Right. And so it even something as simple as just going to the park and hanging out or whatever.

or being able to have some time and actually going to lunch and eating somewhere and just not having their phones be present when they're doing it. We used to do an escape room. We did a whole bunch of them. That worked well. The kids would be starving afterwards because they used their brain so much. They loved it. Right, right. Yeah, because they're distracted. They're not necessarily trying to problem solve. They're not necessarily having to be so tied to their phones, and they're not even thinking about eating.

And so that's what we want. We want them to be able to engage in these activities that are stimulating, that enable them to not feel like they are connected to their phone. And for my kids, again, I feel very fortunate. They love fencing. They're out fencing every probably five days a week, but they're always engaged with their friends around fencing and talking about it. And when they're doing it, they're not thinking about anything else. They're not thinking about their phones. They're not even thinking about eating. They're just really into it.

I was going to joke and say they should be very offensive when they're doing the sport. Right. So to help an individual, who brings them in? They bring them in, the parents bring them in, the school brings them in. What would be a typical protocol that you go through and how long? So...

It would be really anyone can bring them in, right? So at some point, it can be the parent feeling concerned that they are not necessarily engaging in the ways that they want to or they feel uncomfortable, they feel anxious, or a teacher might identify that.

And the work is very tailored to the needs of that young person. And so it's never time limited. It's really, you know, when we talk about our particular protocols in our first imposter syndrome book, when we talked about overcoming imposter syndrome, we developed a course that was a 12-week course from beginning to end where we said if someone is dealing with imposter syndrome at the

beginning of the course, we take their imposter syndrome score. And at the end of the 12 weeks, we have saw a reduction of their imposter syndrome scores by 30%. And so if it's an issue related to imposter syndrome, then we see that, you know, within 12 weeks, that is the particular concern. If it's something else like anxiety or

depression, it can vary. But if it's focused on a positive syndrome, the protocols that we've developed, we have seen remarkable change in a short period of time. Do they go recidivist if they're out of the program for a while? Or do you give them things that they could do to keep their skills? Is it very easy to fall back?

Yeah, this is a great question, right? And so when we talk about the fact that you are reducing your imposter syndrome, what we're talking about is, again, because you're not cured of it, but you've developed tools and strategies that if it is triggered, you know exactly what to do to make sure it doesn't impact your functioning. And that's really what we want to see.

that oftentimes the positive can be so all-consuming for a young person that they are unable to really enjoy different aspects of their lives. But once they go through the particular protocol, they can see, oh, okay, I'm being triggered, like I'm meeting a new person or I'm doing a new task. Now I know how to go back to the tools that I learned through the model to really reduce the imposter syndrome's impact on my functioning. And then I'm back to a baseline that's healthy for me.

But look, people are not going to follow this. They're going to say I'm anxious. They're going to say I'm depressed. I have ADHD. Whatever. So what symptoms kind of go along with this phenomenon? And do they experience relief once they get help? So they definitely experience relief when they get help. If they're dealing solely, as we talked about, with imposter syndrome, then they...

begin to feel like, okay, these automatic negative thoughts are not inundating them. They're not having this narrative about themselves. They're valuing self-care. They're connecting with people. They understand their triggers. So that piece of it is incredible to watch. And as we talked about the fact that with PAS syndrome, there are clear links to

those dealing with Mouth Syndrome having more anxiety or depression. And there hasn't been as much research relative to looking at the link between that, say, more neurodivergent expressions such as ADHD. But I think being able to know and understand that whatever might be contributing to their functioning being impacted outside of Mouth Syndrome, then they get relief when they at least are not having to deal with Mouth Syndrome as much as they did before.

Have you noticed that certain emotions or dysregulation is tied to different syndromes or, I don't know, just like other strains of self-opposed disability or problem or, you know, are people all the same? Like, what do you see clinically? So what we find and what's been interesting for such a long time when imposter syndrome was coined in over 40 some odd years ago, almost close to 50 years ago, 1978, it

It was coined by these two psychologists, Clancy Nimes, that were working with a high-achieving group of women at the time. And for a long time, many thought that imposter syndrome primarily impacted females. And what we see is that it actually can be expressed differently, that for young women,

Women or for women in general, they may tend to deal with imposter syndrome by trying to overwork, which may lead to more stress strain for them. Whereas young men or men in general may tend to try to affiliate with lower achieving peers so that they don't have to take as many risks in being exposed as a fraud. Now, again, this is not absolute across the board, but this is what some of the research says.

Recently, the research did indicate that women may experience it just a bit more than men. So that's been something new to know and understand. But the expressions of it, as I said, have been a little bit different in terms of how different genders deal with it. Again, how have your clients changed it?

over the past 20 years? What are they like now versus 20 years ago or before COVID or what have you seen? So one of the things that I oftentimes talk about is that, and the research indicates, is that there are higher degrees of anxiety in young people nowadays. I do think that a lot of it is, you know, can be attributed to social media and this feeling of always being on and not being able to disconnect.

So that's something that I've witnessed over the 20 years of really being mindful of that distinct difference and how to actually engage with it. I think post-COVID, one of the things that is also evident are that young people and people in general tend to feel more isolative and finding it difficult to kind of re-engage and engage with people as a whole.

And so I think that's something when we think about development of skills, development of interpersonal skills that we need to continue to be mindful of and be on the watch for relative to that. And then, you know, when we look at just some of the expressions that, you know, are related to ADHD.

and things of that nature, we see that there's more of an awareness of it, which I think is a good thing. But I think now the research is a bit mixed of understanding is that just because there's more of an awareness of it, that the diagnosis of it has increased or whether or not there are actually more people experiencing it. And that's something, you know, that's still up for debate. So where do you see all this going? Do you feel like your protocols are strong? They work on most people. Do they need to change or updating or like where are things moving?

Yeah, I'm really proud to say that what we found, especially when we're dealing with and talking about imposter syndrome, that the protocols are very strong relative to being able to see major change in a relatively short period of time. I think the exciting thing now, because we've been doing some of this work, you know, we've been doing some of this work with adults. I think with this book, we're going to be doing it a lot more.

With young people, we then will know and understand how we might need to evolve and modify some of these protocols. So I'm excited to see how that plays out as we continue to engage with these populations, with parents, with coaches and other people that engage with young people. Where can people get help from you? Do they have to live locally? Can you do telemedicine, if it's even called that?

Where can you see patients? Sure. So I have an all virtual practice and it you. So I'm based in New York, but I see clients, you know, from a variety of different places through my particular network. So people can find me by going to my website, Dynamic Transitions.

llp.com, where they can schedule a consultation to talk about whatever particular concerns, and then we can see what is a good fit for them. They could also find my work very active on social media. We're very active now related to the book and engaging with young people and parents. So we have a handle on Instagram called at Smart Parenting Strategy. So you can, we provide advice to parents about, you know, engaging with young people, dealing with

POS syndrome or any issues related to healthy coping and confidence building. Okay. And again, what geographic areas do you serve? So in terms of doing this work, a lot of the work that we do with POS syndrome is through the lens of coaching. So it can be throughout the whole

Well, country and that's right. So the majority of my clients are based on the East Coast. But because of the fact that my practice virtual, I have the ability and have engaged and engaged with clients throughout the country. OK, where can people go to get help and find out more to take that first step? So they can start by going to.

the website, dynamictransitionllp.com, where they can find out more about my work. And if they want, they can schedule an initial 15-minute free consultation where we can talk more about their specific issue and how I might be able to support them in what they're dealing with. Okay, very good. Well, Rich, thank you for what you do. And again, for coming on the show, I appreciate it. It was my pleasure. Thanks to you for having me.

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